DL4MFM's Amateur Radio Blog
Summits On The Air
Summit Activation # 525
This weekend I have activated together with Denis, VA2IEI, DM/NS-108 Piesberg. Denis wanted to try to establish an S2S QSO with North America. His station: KX3 with ALEX loop, my station 20w with FT857D and a linked-dipole. The conditions were worse than ever before. Only 14 QSO in a three-quarter hour at 3°C temperature. But then it was enough …
Zum AGCW VHF Contest war noch einmal sommerliches Wetter. Dazu habe ich den Aussichtsturm auf dem Mordkuhlenberg (DA/NI-238) bestiegen und von dort eine gute Stunde im AGCW UKW Kontest teilgenommen. Das Ergebnis war nicht gerade berauschend, aber rund um die Antenne gab es einige Stationen zu arbeiten und es war dann doch der beste Kilometer-Durchschnitt für mich im AGCW-Wettbewerb auf UKW.
ODX war die französische F6HJO/p Station für 633km.
ODX war die dänische OZ1CT Station auf der Insel Bornholm für 552km.
Der Turm wurde ausgrechnet an diesem Dienstag gesperrt, weil er für den Besucherverkehr nicht mehr sicher genug sei. Ich hoffe, dass einer Sanierung nichts im Wege steht. Schon Ende der 70er Jahre habe ich von dort oben mit meiner Portable-Station (ICOM IC-240, Motorrad-Säurebatterie und HB9CV) meine ersten Bergaktivierungen durchgeführt und war während der letzten 40 Jahre unzählige Male vom Dörenberg qrv. Ich denke, es ist der beste UKW-Standort in Nordwest-Deutschland.
Karte von OpenStreetMap – Veröffentlicht unter ODbL
This month we started the GMAC – Global Mountain Activity Contest. That means, GMA takes part in the „first-tuesday-in-a-month“ 144 MHz contests. But – you have to enter from a GMA summit. Exchange is report and QTH-locator.
For the first entry (after a software test-phase) I used our clubcall DL0GMA. Location was the well known Hermansturm outlook tower – the highest point in our county – on the Dörenberg in the Teutoburg Forest.
In very bad weather I managed 71 QSOs with FT857D (35W) and a 5 ele DK7ZB Yagi.
The evening began dry, then fog came up, later drizzle and then rain. But it was a lot of fun. Also again with other visitors on that tower, who were curious what I am doing …
Sunday, sunny weather, 28°C. Perfect conditions for a hike through the Stemweder Berg in the Naturepark Dümmer DLFF-0051 in Northwest Germany. The HF conditions were bad as the last weeks. 70 QSOs with a linked dipole in the 40, 30 and 20m band with 50 Watts output of YAESU FT857D. I activated two summits, DA/NW-211 Scharfer Berg and close by DM/NW-256 Kollwesshöh.
The Stemweder Berg is the most northern and smallest Mittelgebirge (Low Mountain Range) in Germany.
Summit Activation # 516
Wer hier ab und zu mal hereinliest, der weiß inzwischen, dass jeden ersten Dienstag im Monat so einiges los ist im 2m-Band. Endlich war am Dienstag, den 5. Juli, kein Regen vorhergesagt und auch nur in einiger Entfernung Regen auszumachen. Der erste „erste-Dienstag-im-Monat“ dieses Jahr ohne Regen!
Leider konnte ich erst gegen 20.30 MESZ qrv werden, das hat aber trotzdem dicke gereicht, um diese Bergaktivität für das GMA (Global Mountain Activity) zu qualifizieren. Die Antenne war dauerhaft Richtung Norden gedreht, um Station aus dem NAC (NRAU Activiy Contest, Ausschreibung in Deutsch) zu erwischen.
Zu meiner Überraschung konnte ich sogar noch Pom, DG7ACF/P, vom Berg „Fast“ DM/NS-121 bei Springe für ein Berg-zu-Berg-QSO loggen und auch einige Telegrafie-QSOs sind im Log gelandet.
Station heute:
Karte von OpenStreetMap – Veröffentlicht unter ODbL
Summit Activation # 515
July and really cold temperatures for summer. But no rain this morning and I took the chance to climb on my hausberg, the Piesberg DM/NS-108. I operated about one hour on 2m and 70cm .. only S&P. No special distances are in the log, but 5 DXCC countries. The station was a FT-857D with 25w output, powered by LiPo batteries, and a DK7ZB 5 ele 2m/8 ele 70cm duoband Yagi. Maybe the condx on 70cm were not good or the performance of the antenna on 432 MHz was bad. I worked only one close station and heard some weak stations, but they did not hear me.
After three month of renewed massively reduction of SOTA references in DM I wanted to take a look back at the SOTA activations. Is it just as predicted that nothing will change? Or do the deletions of the many references effects?
From the GMA log the trend is clearly read. In February everyone has probably visited his local mountains. A fabulous activity can be seen with the February peak
From March, the GMA-members are not so often QRV from the DM mountains (blue line), but DA mountains experienced an unbroken popularity and reach in May 2016 even a peak (red line), DL mountains (Germany Alpine SOTA Association, green line) continue to play almost no matter.
The SOTA year 2016 began excelling. In the same period in 2015 there was an increase by 80% (!) of activities.
(Blue = German stations, Orange = foreign visitors)
In the period after the big cutting it looks a bit different. The SOTA activities decreased by 23%, the activations of German operators by 30%. The number of participants has declined by 20%, the share of German Activators even by 33%.
Because of the excellent start to the year 2016 compared to 2015 looks positive.
Here the share of German Activators January-May …
Here the share of German Activators March-May ..
In DA-references (that’s valid for GMA only) it looks like that the number of activator remained unchanged (January-May 2016 compared to 2015), but the number of activations increased to 40%. The Chaser have logged a total of 2,425 different DA-activations of 247 different stations on 375 different DA references.
During the same period 933 activations of DM references were via SOTAwatch published with 153 activators on 457 summits.
(Sources: http://www.cqgma.de, http: //www.sotawatch.org)
In early May I (M0GQY) was on a trip to North Wales for operating from SOTA summits and for a little bit sightseeing. I stayed at Mike, GW0DSP, and his wife Anne, who were fabulous hosts. Thanks again! The wx was quiet good, sometimes very windy on the mountains. HF conditions were sadly not so good. Steve, G1INK, joined us for the most time and we also met Mike, 2E0YYY, on G/SP-010, where we set up 3 stations.
The flight was from Bremen to Manchester and back. Of course, there was again a special security check because of the radio equipment, but everything was okay and the inspectors as usual very friendly.
Here some impressions from the trip:
I was today the first time this year qrv from Piesberg (DM/NS-108 / DLFF-0125) Windchillfactor: ICECOLD. Station: 20w, 5 ele Yagi
Karte von OpenStreetMap – Veröffentlicht unter ODbL
07-FEB-2016: Hankenüll, DM/NS-058, JO42CC. This is a typical landscape from the Teutoburg Forrest. A small ridgeway and on both sides it falls steep down. This was the last SOTA activation from this summit, meanwhile it is deleted. 50 QSOs within one hour, 11°C, heavy winds, 25w output to a linked dipole and a lot S2S (Summit to Summit) qsos.
